Antron 99 10/11 meters

[wpwx694]

I have an antron 99 for the house and have not touched the tuning rings when I got it. I have a Icom 706 mkII with a MFJ-939 antenna tuner and my CB hooked up straight to the antenna.

I checked swr with tuner and it is good for 10 meter, but when I check it with out the tuner for 10 meter it's high.

Cb radio swr is great.

Should I mess with the tuning rings?

 

[K4EET]

Probably not if you primarily work 11 Meters. It is doubtful if you could get an acceptable SWR on that antenna for both bands simultaneously. On top of that, since the Antron 99 is a CB antenna, it may not even tune for 10 Meters. Stick with the antenna tuner for the ICOM rig or put up a dedicated 10 Meter antenna.

 

[John_S]

I would say yes because you may be able to broad band the tuning enough to use 10m, 11m, 12m, and possibly 15m. You really need an analyzer to get this done easily, along with possibly a 10' piece of mast to get the A99 a reasonable height above ground, a very short piece of coax, and the analyzer. Start adjusting the rings and watch the SWR. Somewhere along the threaded column you should find a place where things become usable on at least three of those bands. If possible, try hooking your regular coax after to make sure everything is still good. After any final adjustment, wrap the rings and the threaded plastic area with electrical tape, so that they are locked and won't move. You may not get 1:1 everywhere, but you should be able to find under 2:1 where it's needed. This is absolutely doable. I've done this with both an A99 and an IMAX 2000, and it's not a bad solution when all you can set up is a basic vertical. Try to set final height at least 27 to 30 feet above ground.

 

[wpwx694]

Thanks

 

[prcguy]

I had an A99 years ago and it was not very broad band, it would cover ch 1 through 40 ok but the bottom of 10m was well above 2:1 and got worse as you went up in frequency. 15m was a really bad match out of the box. I did play with the tuning rings and it would tuning into 10m just fine with a great match but tuning to 15m was a lot of adjusting the other direction which I never completed and I just put it back on CB until I gave the antenna to a friend.

My experience says the A99 is a narrow band antenna, requires tuning to use on another band and I think most people who use them on 10 and 15m are using an auto tuner in their radio to cover these bands and living with the terrible match and reduced performance when used out of band.

 

[707ways2Sunday]

I have an antron 99 for the house and have not touched the tuning rings when I got it. I have a Icom 706 mkII with a MFJ-939 antenna tuner and my CB hooked up straight to the antenna.

I checked swr with tuner and it is good for 10 meter, but when I check it with out the tuner for 10 meter it's high.

Cb radio swr is great.

Should I mess with the tuning rings?

Are you saying when your tuner is in line in bypass mode your SWRs are good on 10M. ??? But with the tuner out of line they are not good? With just the radio.

 

[robertwbob]

only way you get low swr on 10 meters is read the instruction sheet and cut the top rod off a bit. cant tell you off top of my head but its like 11 inches. but if you do that forget 11 meters.
i got mine set for 10 meters with low swr. i find i like it better for 10 meters than i ever did on 11 meters
now i got a sirio 2008 up and swr is very low on 11 meter ,and like 1:6 to 1 on 10 meters. the sirio is better and wide banded.

 

[John_S]

Perfectly usable results can be had with an A99 without cutting it. It needs the rings adjusted by using an analyzer. I've successfully used both an A99 and the IMAX 2000 on 10, 12, and 15 without doing that. All that's needed after is a decent tuner.

 

[merlin]

I have seen the A99 is just too narrow to tune 10, 11, and 15 meters. Chose a band, tune the antenna and go with that.
Using a tuner will present a low SWR to the radio, but will not fix the tuning of the antenna.

 

[John_S]

I'll say it again...if someone is willing to take the time to adjust the tuning rings properly, this antenna can easily be broadbanded enough to make it usable on at least 10, 11, and 12 meters. The use of a tuner is totally acceptable and totally normal for many antennas on ham bands. Been there and done that and made lots of contacts with an A99. It's just a basic 18' wire 1/2 wavelength vertical with a rather oddball matching section. Even the 1/2 wave I use tuned toward the upper portion of 10m...the FM section...tunes easily down to 11 and 12m and further.

 

[prcguy]

I'll say it again...if someone is willing to take the time to adjust the tuning rings properly, this antenna can easily be broadbanded enough to make it usable on at least 10, 11, and 12 meters. The use of a tuner is totally acceptable and totally normal for many antennas on ham bands. Been there and done that and made lots of contacts with an A99. It's just a basic 18' wire 1/2 wavelength vertical with a rather oddball matching section. Even the 1/2 wave I use tuned toward the upper portion of 10m...the FM section...tunes easily down to 11 and 12m and further.

The A99 is 18ft of wire with a narrow band matching circuit at the base to get the very high impedance 1/2 wave end fed element to 50 ohms. The end result is kind of like a J-pole. If the A99 is tuned for CB and you use an external tuner at the radio to get the match down you can certainly transmit on 15m but the efficiency is going to suffer compared to adjusting the tuning rings on the antenna for 15m and not using an external tuner. Your coax loss will also go up beyond advertised loss per ft depending on the mismatch.

 

[AB5ID]

Your coax loss will also go up beyond advertised loss per ft depending on the mismatch.

It might also account for the "false perception" of being broadband from 12 to 10 meters on the radio end of the coax.

 

[robertwbob]

I have seen the A99 is just too narrow to tune 10, 11, and 15 meters. Chose a band, tune the antenna and go with that.
Using a tuner will present a low SWR to the radio, but will not fix the tuning of the antenna.

i agree with you 100%. all a tuner does is keep from toasting radios . and if tuner goes out then its OUCHIE $$$

 

[robertwbob]

I'll say it again...if someone is willing to take the time to adjust the tuning rings properly, this antenna can easily be broadbanded enough to make it usable on at least 10, 11, and 12 meters. The use of a tuner is totally acceptable and totally normal for many antennas on ham bands. Been there and done that and made lots of contacts with an A99. It's just a basic 18' wire 1/2 wavelength vertical with a rather oddball matching section. Even the 1/2 wave I use tuned toward the upper portion of 10m...the FM section...tunes easily down to 11 and 12m and further.

i tried that and those rings dont adjust ear that far. like i said read the sheet of paper it came with. explains its not wide band but can be trimmed for many bands

 

[John_S]

The A99 is 18ft of wire with a narrow band matching circuit at the base to get the very high impedance 1/2 wave end fed element to 50 ohms. The end result is kind of like a J-pole. If the A99 is tuned for CB and you use an external tuner at the radio to get the match down you can certainly transmit on 15m but the efficiency is going to suffer compared to adjusting the tuning rings on the antenna for 15m and not using an external tuner. Your coax loss will also go up beyond advertised loss per ft depending on the mismatch.

Of course the efficiency will drop some, but it's still very usable and more effective on these upper bands than a multiband dipole for the lower bands. You can never out do an antenna that's tuned for the frequency you're operating on. As far as usability goes, check the reviews for the Solarcon A99 on eHam. There's a lot of very satisfied users there running these on more than one band. If someone is willing to take the time and use a nanoVNA to watch what happens as they adjust the rings, there's an area where the SWR may not be perfect everywhere, but usable over a broad range. This is especially true for the IMAX 2000 with it's longer element.